Only a handful of people know that public speaking the world's number 1 fear? I had no idea, that was until 25 years ago when my professional life took a turn for the worse. Sweaty palms, uncontrollable nerves, a quavering voice did not endear me to the Board of the company I had recently joined. For me, it was the fear of the unknown. Almost fear of fear itself. I was young, new, I had zero experience of making presentations. My pride prevented me from asking for help. As the big day approached, my preparation or lack of it, presented me with an enormous headache. The result of my lack of planning, preparation and practice cast a dark shadow over my professional life for some time. So what did I do to get over it? First of all, I sought some professional help from a voice coach in Manchester. He taught me how to breathe from the diaphragm which has two key benefits to the speaker. Initially, effective breath control produces and improved voice. Secondly, diaphragmatic breathing introduces large levels of oxygen into the blood stream which helps to reduce muscle tension. The other benefit is that when that oxygen begins to hit the brain, everything begins to slow down. Try it yourself. Recline in a tranquil place and breath deeply for a period of two to three minutes. You will feel a sensation of euphoric calm. It's free, it's effective, so please get in to the habit of self help. Have you ever witnessed the behaviour of somebody who is totally stressed out? What do we say to them? Well usually, 'Calm down! Take a deep breath'. The anger and stress soon passes as the oxygen hits the brain. When we are calm and in control of our emotions we make better decisions. As speakers, it's vitally important that we're in control of ourselves because we have to concentrate on our pitch, pace, pause and projection as well as attuning it to excellent content with a powerful messages. Another pressure that I needlessly put on myself was wanting to be 100% correct. My fear of being found infallible as a human was a pain too far. Naturally, better planning, preparation and practise would have helped my confidence, but by that time I was already way out of my depth. It is my plan to discuss further effective techniques for overcoming the fear of public speaking in subsequent articles. Copyright (c) 2010 The College Of Public Speaking
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